Rideable hexawalker is Chibikart’s kin

The folks from MIT made their way to the NYC Maker Faire, and of course brought a pair of Chibikarts. [Nancy Ouyang] wouldn’t allow those portable go karts take center stage at the MIT booth though; her Hexarideablepod (yes, that’s what she calls it) saw much more action from the kids clamoring to take something for a drive.

From the video above, [Nancy] shows off her six-legged, tennis ball-footed creation. The entire machine is powered by car batteries and is controlled via two joysticks in something resembling driving a tank Nope, it’s powered by A123 lipos and controlled with triggers taken from an electric drill.

As per [Nancy]’s wishes, I must mention that this project was for MITERS, a.k.a. the people from MIT that came down to Maker Faire.

Proper video after the break. The Internet at Maker Faire is horrible, give me a break.

Ah, but a steering wheel is so much less fun. With the triggers, you can pretend you’re on a hexapod robot fighting against the forces of evil!
Hmm. Although, everyone seems to want to do the “walking robot” thing with the arms when they get on it. Maybe I will implement it with pots one day…

You could achieve a smoother ride by synchronizing the legs somewhat; with a hexapod you usually want 3 legs on the ground at any time. Since the two sides are independent, three legs on the ground may not always be the case.

Suspension wouldn’t hurt either, but doing that would help and it’s a lot easier to add.

Yep! I did want to make a controls system that would enforce the tripod gate. It’s very obvious when the legs fall out of tripod gait because then it tends to “gallop” and do the rocking horse thing. Thankfully, little kids just think it’s part and parcel of riding a hexapod robot :D

I must admit I have a much clearer idea of how to implement controls than a suspension system. I’m a terrible meche… anyway, unfortunately probably hexarideablepod won’t receive any substantial updates anytime soon, because yay more projects!

I’d like to point out that it was controlled by two cordless drill triggers, one per motor, not joysticks. Also, the batteries were A123 Systems Lithium iron phosphate batteries, which are about as far from car batteries as you can get.

Turning every sentence into a question, and it wouldn’t be﻿ hard to make a smoother, more comfortable, and probably more efficient mechanism than this in a day. Someone making something this unimpressive and being proud that they just ripped the mechanism off from a cheap kids toy can’t be the best MIT has to offer…

I can see where your comment comes from, because I thought that myself a lot. But I have to say that I hate being “an MIT person.” I don’t represent MIT, and frankly I am tired of doubting myself and have decided that I will be proud of what I’ve done. It’s fun and the little kids riding it don’t care whether it’s the most awesome polished original project ever. This was my first major project — I didn’t even know how to wire a circuit breaker or how to weld when I started — and no, I didn’t inherit it from some other student, I built it by myself. And guess what? Everyone starts somewhere, and it’s entirely reasonable to start by copying things to gain the skills I need to make my own things. Yes, this was entirely derived from an awesome instructables by rpalanteo. That sort of attitude discourages people from attempting to start making things, and I suspect disproportionately girls.
/end rant.

your wrong. Anyone building ANYTHING is an achivement. Lots of people, of which I supect you might be one, spend all thier time not building anything because “the world” is not “up to spec” with “how it ought to be made”. It might be a bit crude, I dispise 2 motor hexapods, but SO MUCH is learned in even the simplest build that its always worth it.